Pipe coupling



May 30, 1933. 7 R. J. PARSONS PIPE COUPLING Filed Oct. 28, 1931 ENVENTOR 112N761? JParsons BY HIS ATTORNEY Patented May 30, 1933 UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE ROBERT J. PARSONS, OF SGHENECTADY, NEW YORK, ASSIGNOR TO CONSOLIDATED CAR HEATING COMPANY, INC., OF ALBANY, NEW YORK, A CORPORATION OF NEW YORK PIPE COUPLING Application filed October 28, 1931.

My invention relates to a car coupling for conducting steam from car to car. In such a system the coupling ordinarily includes two depending flexible sections each constituting an extension of the horizontal metal pipe in the car. These sections carry at their lower ends the complementary halves of the disconnectible parts which normally engage each other to join the two sections into a continuous channel for the steam.

In such sections, which extend down below the level of the main pipe on the car body, there is a tendency for collection of water resulting from the condensation of the steam and in cold weather this water is liable to freeze, with unfortunate results.

My present invention consists of a small tube contained in each of these depending sections which is open at its lower end and, by pressure of steam in the pipes, gathers up any water that may have accumulated at the bottom of the depression, by the two connected sections, and conducts that water upward to a trap formed on the end of the main pipe above the section connected thereto. In that trap a bellows-operated valve is opened as usual by the contraction, and closed by the expansion, of the bellows. Thus the water accumulated in the trap is allowed to discharge into the atmosphere, as the bellows contract and open by loss of heat.

The figure of the drawing represents a side elevation of the invention as applied to a car coupling.

Referring to the drawing, A represents the end of a main horizontal pipe on the car body. B is a depending section forming a continuation of pipe A and at its lower end is coupled to a corresponding section depending in like manner from the main pipe on an adjacent car. On the inside of section B, I place a small tube C which is open at its lower end and at its upper end delivers into a trap chamber D on the under side of pipe A. In chamber D is an expansible sealed enclosure or bellows E which, as it expands, closes a valve F opening from chamber D into the atmosphere and, as it contracts, opens that valve to allow any water in D to escape into the air.

Serial No. 571,645.

By this means any water that may have accumulated at the bottom of the loop or depression, created by the connected sections B, is forced by the steam pressure up the small tube 0 and delivered into the chamber D whence it is delivered to the atmosphere through valve F when that valve is opened.

Thus the accumulation of water in the de pressed sections B is prevented, together with such troubles as might result from the freezing of that water.

What I claim as new and desire to secure by Letters Patent is:

1. The combination with the coupler sections of a train line of an internally located tube leading upwardly from the lower part of said sections and conducting water therefrom to a trap on the level above the said sections.

2. The combination with a train line having a depressed coupler section of a tube leading upward inside said depressed section and subject to steam pressure, and a thermally controlled chamber higher than the depression into which the said tube opens and into which the steam pressure forces the moisture through said tube.

Signed at Albany, county of Albany, State of New York, this 20th day of October, 1931.

ROBERT J. PARSONS. 

